The surrealistic life of work and play!

Lately has been interestng times with work. It seems that I have been working without a contract, and now they are asking me to sign one. I was under the impression that the letter of intent would work as my contract for this year, or at least that the contract they would give me to sign would be basically the same as the previous one; however this is not the case. The whole process has made me somewhat dubious about things around here, as does the situation with other workers here.

I am in the process of looking for another job. I received a reply to send copies of transcripts and my passport to a place in Kuait. I have heard that it is a good place to work, and the money is better than here, that is for sure. I am not so sure I want to leave, but if too much more happens here, I am not going to be able to in good faith/concience sign the contract. I guess we just have to wait and see what happens.

On another note, I started Turkish lessons last night and found it to be quite an interesting experience. If I do decide to stay, I will have people that I can talk to outside of work and something else to do as well. I just have to learn not to immediately dot my 'i's as those with dots are different letters than those without. I learned the word for many yesterday, and much to my surprise, it is the same word used in the Hawaiian English: /choke/. I am not sure how it came about to be the same word, but I am sure not to forget it!

I received a text message today. It was in kurdish and it is inviting "me" to a dinner for someone who has a familiar name. I do not know who it is from, and it is probably a wrong number, but it is interesting to recieve nonetheless. Who knows, perhaps it is from someone at Ishek University who for got the fact that I don't speak Kurdish~ I have to make something up to make it interesting AND make sense....

I will attempt to keep you updated on all the happenings as they unfold.

I have finally done it!!

Yes, you have read that correctly; I have finally done it! Now, you may be asking, what could cause such a stir that I have to write home about it? It is very simple: I bought a phone refill card! This was the first time I have attempted to refill my minutes since I have come to Kurdistan back in March. If that doesn't say exciting, I don't know what does!

I went out last night with the group from work. I haven't been out of the house except to go to work in so long, I had forgotten what it was like. The crowded restaurants were not exactly my cup of tea, but I did mostly enjoy hanging out with them again. Unfortunately, there was more than a fare share of drama, but I managed to stay out of it myself. I was, however, fortunate enough to meet some very interesting new people from out of town. Who knows, maybe I will go to their city and visit them someday soon. They are Kurdish and also live in the Kurdistan Region. I would love to do more traveling around this place; there are so many beautiful places that I haven't been to.

I finally made it home around 3ish in the morning. I decided as I don't have to work today, that I would sleep late. Apparently my body had other ideas: I was up at 6:20am! I have to work tomorrow until 1pm, but then I am free until 6pm when I have to go to the local Turkish university to see about taking a Turkish course. I need to finally finish my language requirement; it is costing me a severe amount of money every month by not having it complete. So, the sooner I get it done, the better!

Nothing else is new around this place...talk about boring. Though I must say, if I really wanted to look around and such, I could find more to do here than I could back home in Standish...

my first day of teaching and all other things that have come

Well, it has been a few days since I began teaching (ok, so it has only been two), and I must say it has been interesting. The second year students are back, and they are in rare form. I was so glad to have them in class again, but I had forgotten how frustrating class with them can be. They have to take science, math, and IT Literacy along with English, and they are having a difficult time with it. I found out that their logic skills are a bit lacking, so this is what is making is so tough. For example, they need to know what "scientific process" is, so I asked them "What is a process?" They tell me. Then I ask what "scientific process." They tell me that they don't know. So I explain: "If a process is how we do something, scientific process is how we do science." "Ahhhh!" They seemed to be expressing understanding, so I go a step further: "If scientific process is the way we do science, what is educational process?" This through them.

Seeing their inability to answer I say "educational process is the way we do education. What is educational process?" They still were unable to answer. Not only could they not make the logical jump from one to the other, they even have trouble listening to when I actually give them the answer! This really frustrates me sometimes.

Of course the administration frustrates me as well. I had a new class today, and I didn't find out that I had it until 2 hours before. That is I learned that I had a class, not anything about it such as the level, the number of students, the time! How can one prepare if they do not know these things? The class eventually came, and it went well. The students are very low level, but they really want to learn and are eager to do whatever I ask.

I will end with telling about my first day. It should have been first, but I have such fond memories, that I wanted to save it for last. That day I was being so accident prone. First I kept dropping my marker, then I dropped the cap and it rolled into the whole that is being covered by the teacher's table. After this, I was writing on the board and gesturing, and the marker flew out of my hand. It was so embarrassing, but the students seemed to have fun with it. Finally, as I was erasing the board, the eraser fell apart in my hand! What a day.... the excitement never ends :)